Former Vice President of the United States Mike Pence claimed Friday that when he left office, he did not take any classified documents with him.
Pence made the remark in an interview with The Associated Press in Iowa, about a week and a half after the FBI recovered classified and top-secret documents during a raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.
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When asked if he kept any sensitive information after leaving office, Pence replied, “No, not to my knowledge.”
The disclosure, which would normally be unremarkable for a former vice president, is noteworthy in light of the fact that FBI investigators raided Trump’s house on August 8 while investigating suspected violations of three different federal statutes. Trump has claimed that the records obtained by investigators were “all declassified,” and that if the Justice Department had requested, he would have turned them over.
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Despite Pence’s claim that he and his team followed rules requiring the submission of classified material to the National Archives, the former vice president raised the possibility that the investigation was politically motivated and urged Attorney General Merrick Garland to reveal more information about what prompted authorities to conduct the search.
“The concern that millions of Americans felt is only going to be resolved with daylight,” he added. “I know that’s not customary in an investigation. But this is unprecedented action by the Justice Department, and I think it merits an unprecedented transparency.”
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His remarks came just days after he asked his fellow Republicans to quit blaming rank-and-file FBI agents for the Mar-a-Lago search. On Wednesday, he spoke at a political breakfast in New Hampshire, attempting to quell some of the growing threats against the FBI by passionate Trump fans who are upset that Trump’s home was searched.
“The Republican Party is the party of law and order,” Pence stated on Wednesday. “Our party stands with the men and women who stand on the thin blue line at the federal and state and local level, and these attacks on the FBI must stop.”
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Pence was in Iowa on Friday as part of a two-day visit to the state, which will host the Republican presidential caucuses in 2024. Pence indicated Friday that he will decide whether to run for president early next year, a choice that his allies say will be independent of anything Trump does.
After visiting the Iowa State Fair on Friday afternoon, Pence headlined a fundraiser for Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley earlier in the day and was slated to speak to a Christian conservative group and a northern Iowa county Republican party campaign before departing Saturday.